Friday, July 30, 2010

Saturday, July 24, 2010

As promised in my last post, we did some hard core potty training this week. Wow. They should warn you about potty training before you get pregnant. It was horrible!

Monday was our last day of diapers. I got as much as I could get done around the house and Monday morning I had a meeting at the hospital where the kids spent months in the NICU. I was asked to be on the family advisory council. I guess when you spend months at the hospital and spend a couple million on your kids you get asked to be on these things! Drew took the kids and went to the first night of vacation bible school. They had fun dancing to the music but I hear they didn’t like it when Drew tried to leave them in the nursery. I think they still had fun on their last evening in diapers.

I know everyone potty trains differently, but I decided to try the 3 Day Potty Training method by Lora Jensen. It’s 3 days of doing nothing but watching your kid(s) and trying to catch them starting to pee or poop and running them to the potty. It’s 3 days of saying, “Tell Mommy or Daddy if you need to go to the potty.”

It has been a tough week for us. The hardest part was giving up any form of a life. On the first morning of potty training a friend called and while talking to her we missed Will pooping. From then on I knew I honestly had to devote all my time and energy to this project. Normally I’m doing something while the kids are playing. This week it was just us sitting and staring at the kids, waiting for them to pee. I’m sure they actually loved it because they got so much more focused attention this week.

Tuesday morning was d-day. As soon as they woke up I sat them on the potty and then put them in big kid underpants. Will had worn them before, back in May when I played around with potty training. Lindy had never worn them. The kids peed and pooped all day long in their pants. Each time we would run them to the potty and try to get them to finish in the potty. It was a really long, hard day. Lindy did NOT like feeling wet when she peed. She would cry so hard whenever she did wet herself. Drew spent all day Tuesday helping me but had to leave in the early evening for vacation bible school. It was like they knew I was alone and they started having accidents at the same time. I was harried and completely frazzled by the time they went to bed. (In pull-ups. I’m not brave enough to even attempt potty training at nap or night time).

One reason I was so worried all day Tuesday is because we are living in a rental house right now and I did not want to ruin the carpet with this potty training adventure. Wednesday morning I was up way early and at Walmart by 6:15am to get drop clothes to protect the carpet. We covered the play room and living room floors and I’m so glad we did. I could breathe a little easier knowing if they did go it was on plastic, not the carpet.

Wednesday proceeded on, exactly like Tuesday had. Accidents all day long and us saying, “Tell us if you have to go potty.” We had a few successes, catching them and having them finish on the potty. We chose to give the kids stickers on a sticker chart if they did put any pee in the potty. Neither seemed to be getting it at all.

Thursday we woke up and kept on with the “Tell Mommy when you need to go to the potty.” I was really doubting whether this was going to work when lo and behold, Will said, “Need to go potty.”!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1 A breakthrough!!!! I kissed him all over, clapped, yelled, and went crazy. I think he knew I was excited. A little while later he told me again. GrandBob dropped by for a little visit and I think he went 3 times while he was here. It seemed like it was clicking! He saw how excited we were and he enjoyed getting stickers for his chart. After he filled his first one up he got a new Play-Doh toy and a piece of candy. He liked those treats a lot! He really started getting motivated for stickers and more treats after that! He woke up from his nap and continued to do well.

I had planned all week to go back to vacation bible school on Thursday night. I put them in pull-ups just in case but Will did great! He told us 3 times he needed to go and didn’t have any accidents.

Friday continued on the same way with him telling me all day when he had to pee. He filled up another sticker chart and was proud of himself as well. We went back to vacation bible school Friday night and he did great again. Except that he quickly figured out that if he told us he needed to go to the potty that we’d take him and he didn’t have to sit and be quiet. He told us about 10 times he had to go potty. We took him every time and every time he peed, even if it was just the tiniest amount. I’m shocked how quickly he figured that one out.

He has done great all day today as well. We headed to Raleigh to meet my friend Jamie’s brand new baby and then we went to another friend’s daughter’s 1st birthday party. He has been in a pull-up all day just because I was nervous but he has done awesome!

I will say that he is not pooping in the potty. I don’t think he is not pooping in the potty on purpose, I think he honestly just hasn’t gotten that part yet. We’ll keep working hard to get that part accomplished but I’m a little nervous. I keep hearing horror stories from so many people how their kids refused to poop in the potty. We shall see!

Lindy? Lindy you ask? Well she is NOT potty trained. It just didn’t work for her. She cried so hard when she peed on herself on Tuesday and most of Wednesday but Wednesday afternoon she started to not mind so much. After that she’d pee and be completely fine. Sometimes she’d come tell me and other times I’d feel her and she’d be wet. I kept going with it but decided by late Friday morning that it just wasn’t working. This was right after the time when she was standing next to me and the next second she was laying flat on her back on the kitchen floor. I looked down to find the biggest puddle of pee to date and she had stepped in it and her feet went out from under her and she landed on her back. I put her in a pull-up for the rest of the day and she totally didn’t care and continued peeing in them all afternoon. I just don’t think she is ready. I’m going to keep telling her to tell us when she needs to go but I’m going to back off her and try again later. I’ll still put her on the potty though, I’m not totally backing off. One fun thing about potty training Lindy was dealing with her braces. She really needs to wear them most of the day, but when she had them on and had accidents, she would get the straps on the braces wet with urine. It wasn’t fun! I ended up rinsing the straps out each night and letting them dry overnight. Not too many people have to deal with that little problem!

So as my friend Callie said, I’m 1/4 of the way done. Which I personally think sounds like we have a lot left to do. But I’ll take one kid who can tell me when he can pee in the potty over nothing.

We were supposed to have hearing therapy on Thursday but our teacher cancelled because she was sick. I don’t know the last time we had an appointment free week. They don’t happen often.

Real life can now resume. I can go back to doing things around my house and checking my email and answering the phones! We have a week full of appointments and a big 3rd birthday party!!

Heading to the first night of vacation bible school on Monday night.Wearing big kid undies! Our living room and playroom! This sums up how potty training went with Lindy. The essential potty training basket filled with paper towels, wipes, clorox wipes,flushable wipes, and extra underwear. The kids at vacation bible school. Our new church put on an amazing vacation bible school. I was very impressed! Playing and waiting for dinner to start. Lindy managed to make her way up to the front and into the arms of the people leading the music!Meeting Miss Mollie for the first time! So little. I got my baby fix in for awhile! Lindy seemed pretty interested in Mollie but Will couldn’t have cared less. Chris, Lindy, and Mia Will loved Mia’s playroom. He especially loved the drums and the trampoline!Lindy had fun with a little help from Daddy. The proud family. Jamie, Chris, big sister Mia, and baby Mollie. My best friend, Carrie, and the birthday girl, Rebecca. Rebecca and her big sister Anna. Grandmother holding the party girl after her cake.

Can you believe Lindy and Will turn 3 this week???????????????????????????

Sunday, July 18, 2010

We were back to the daily grind this week with quite a few appointments.

Tuesday we started back with physical therapy. My mom and Will went with Lindy and me. It was so nice to have someone there to chase Will while I tried to concentrate on Lindy’s therapy. We are going to have to cast her again soon for new braces. Apparently she is growing! We left PT and we drove to Greensboro for lunch and then dropped my mom off at the airport. We sure did hate to see her go. I love my mom so much :)

Wednesday was another busy day with speech therapy in the morning. Lawson is spending more time with Lindy these days than Will since he is talking so much. We did work with Lindy again on being loud. We used the echo microphone and she did well imitating the way we said things. Wednesday afternoon Lindy and I headed to pick up her ear molds. One of them is a good fit and the other one we have a few problems with. If it’s not in the exact right position we can hear some feedback. We’ll see how it does in the next couple days.

Wednesday night was a BIG night in our house. The kids had a swallow study in March and they were both fine on thin liquids – meaning they did not aspirate them. Ever since March I have been weaning the thickener in their liquid. Wednesday night, for the first time ever, I opened the gallon of milk, poured it in their cups, and handed it to them. They drank plain, old, regular milk!!!!!!! There is a little bit of coughing that occurs when they first start drinking it but I think they are doing well. I am still thickening their water because it is naturally thinner than milk. It won’t be thickened too much longer. It’s so EASY to get them milk! I’m loving this! It just makes me so nervous. They were always silent aspirators so we never knew they were aspirating until they had their swallow studies. I hope the coughing they are doing is just them trying to get used to it and not them allowing it to go in their airways. But if they are letting it go in their airway then by coughing they are getting it back out. I sure hope we don’t end up with aspiration pneumonia from all this. Keeping our fingers crossed they are okay inside there!

Thursday was another busy day with vision in the morning and hearing in the afternoon. The kids got to play with stamps in vision therapy which they enjoyed doing. Lindy did well in hearing therapy too. We used the echo mic again and Lindy did awesome with her speech babble. We are trying to get her to imitate us quickly. It’s harder for Lindy to listen and process what she’s heard than those of us with normal hearing. To get her to respond quickly is great. We had her alternating vowels, such as ‘bah buh’ and even went for three, such as ‘bee bee bop.’ She did great with it! I think she surprised Chris!

Thursday night we had dinner with some friends and the kids enjoyed running up and down their long hallway and playing with their big red bouncy ball. They also enjoyed being rolled up in the yoga mat.

Friday the kids and I went shopping and picked up more stuff for the house. We’re basically settled in the house but there are still tons of things on my want list!

Saturday evening we went with a group from our new church, Faith, to Shatley Springs for dinner. It is a restaurant that we have heard about for years now. Because of the car seats we had to follow the bus up there. It was a two hour ride! But it was good. It was a family style restaurant where they bring all the food to your tables in bowls and you just pass everything around. It’s all you can eat. It was an enjoyable evening getting to know our new church people. The kids loved all the attention they got. The bus almost had to spend the night up there because they could not get the doors to close! They finally got it and we were all able to head home safely!

This morning we had our second Sunday at the new church (we were in Ohio last week). Will did cry again when I left the nursery but I think it was for a shorter amount of time. He was holding on to me for dear life and I finally had to hand him over crying. They said he stopped crying and played pretty quickly. Robin, the same woman that was there the first Sunday was also there today so I think that helped that he at least recognized her. One of his new friends, Bec, took him outside to play a little and I’m sure that helped a ton. After church they had a big pot luck lunch for us as a welcome. WOW. What a spread they had there. They also did the neatest thing for us. They had a ‘pounding’ for us. As in an old fashion pounding when someone moves into a new house they collect non-perishable and cleaning items. We came home with SO much stuff today! Our new church was very generous to us and we thought it was such a neat welcome.

This upcoming week will be another adventure for us. We have a practically free week so we are going to attempt potty training with both the kids. Wish me luck!

I shipped my good camera off :( I sure do miss it. These are taken with my old camera that just can’t catch some active almost 3 year olds! But they are better than nothing!

Drinking regular milk for the FIRST time in their nearly three years of existence! My parents got the kids medical kits either for their last birthday or Christmas, I’m not sure. I put them away and found them while unpacking. The kids LOVE them. Especially Lindy who doesn’t go anywhere now without a stethoscope and her doctors bag. The kids have been playing 'ring around the rosie’ lately. Not sure if Lindy likes to play but Will grabs her hands and turns her around. They do enjoy the falling down part. For the first time ever I let them ride in the two-seater cart at Target. I started pushing and said something about it being a boat. From then on Will talked about riding in the boat and by the end of our trip he said I was pushing a sailboat! Doctor Swimsuit to the rescue. Playing with a new sprinkler outside. Thanks Callie, Chris, and Jack! Lindy won’t go by herself but she likes it if you run her through it or hold her hand and walk through it. Even Drew had some fun with the sprinkler! Lindy took her car to the car wash. She kept backing up but couldn’t figure out why she was getting wet! The kids also ate popsicles for the first time ever. I made them and they were supposed to be dripless……they weren’t. Lindy weaseled her way onto the bus and into Wayne’s lap and wanted to help drive! Getting ready to go to ‘daddy’s new church'.’ Our Pounding goods. WOW!